New Yorker Melanie Mertzel did not suspect that she had a twin sister until the age of 23, writes the Daily Mail. At this age, the girl encountered her copy thanks to a fluke.
Sometimes it’s a blessing to see your own clone, and little American twins who got to know each other thanks to a surprise from their adoptive parents can confirm this. It’s cooler just to find your twin on Instagram and find out that the double is just the tip of the iceberg.
But getting to know your exact copy and understanding that your separation is a cruel experiment of a scientist is no longer very pleasant. At least Melanie and her sister Ellen didn’t like it.
In 1990, Melanie worked at the International Pancake House for her parents. One of the visitors of the institution, having approached the counter, suddenly began to behave strangely.
She looked at me and didn’t understand why I didn’t recognize her, the Daily Mail quotes the woman.
Two weeks later, this client returned to the cafe with a photo of her niece Ellen. She showed the picture to Melanie’s boyfriend, and he was surprised to recognize his girlfriend in it. The photo not only confused Melanie but also intrigued her.
Mertzel got stuck with the woman who brought the picture, Ellen’s phone number. Calling the mysterious stranger, she was surprised to hear her own voice and her own laughter on the other end of the line.
That evening, the girls talked for a long time about everything in the world, and when they finally met, they realized that they were mirror images of each other. This feeling was only intensified by the fact that one of them was left-handed and the other right-handed.
The similarity between Ellen and Melanie was not limited to appearance: the girls had the same views on life and tastes. At the same time, Ellen admitted that as a child she always wanted her to have a twin sister.
The desire of the American was fulfilled after many years, but the joy was overshadowed by the history of the separation of girls. Ellen and Melanie both grew up in foster families, and their parents knew nothing about the connection between the girls.
Faced with each other in reality, Ellen and Melanie decided to find out why they are so similar to each other and went to the adoption agency Louise Wise Services, which once placed them in foster families.
The company didn’t tell them anything. The agency employee only confirmed that Ellen and Melanie are twins, but all other information remained classified.
Journalists do not specify when and how Ellen and Melanie learned the truth about their childhood, but they report: both American women should thank the American psychiatrist Peter Neubauer because they became part of his experiment.
The essence of the study, which the doctor began back in the 1960s, was to separate identical twins given up for adoption shortly after birth and distribute them to different families.
And then observe their lives to see if their achievements and failures are the results of the environment that raised them, or their natural qualities.
The details and results of the study, recorded by Neubauer himself, are not exactly known and will remain a secret until 2065. This is exactly what the psychiatrist who died in 2008 ordered, despite the requests of the separated twins to see data about themselves.
Ellen and Melanie do not approve of the scientist’s methods of work, and the point is not only that because of this they lost the opportunity to meet in childhood or even grow up in the same foster family.
We were treated not like people, but like animals,” Ellen says.
